1. A-F School Grading Graduation Rates
The A-F grading system provides accountability on how schools and districts are meeting the needs of New Mexico’s diverse student population. The report card presenting each school’s grade provides a tool for educators, parents, and the public to see what is working well and what needs additional work.
This module on the calculation of graduation rates is one in a series that explains the components of the School Grading system.
Graduation Rates

2. National Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate
Comparable and meaningful across states
Students who do not graduate within four years are counted as nongraduates in the four-year cohort rate
Credit given for students who take longer than four years to graduate
Schools accountable for improving graduation rates for all students and student subgroups
National high school graduation rates were established to make them more comparable and meaningful among all states. The U.S. Department of Education first collected the Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate, which we call the four-year cohort graduation rate, in school year 2011.
The 4-year cohort graduation rate measures the percentage of students who graduate within four years with a regular high school diploma. It ensures that students who do not graduate within four years are counted as nongraduates in the 4-year cohort graduation rate, but it gives credit for those students who take longer than four years to graduate.
The 4-year cohort graduation rate is a public-facing measure that holds schools accountable for improving graduation rates for all students and student subgroups.

3. Understanding Graduation Rates
Lagged by one year
How are graduation rates and points determined?
Assigning students to the 4-year cohort
Applying shared accountability
Computing the cohort graduation rates
Computing graduation points for school grading
Graduation rules apply to students who began high school in the fall of a given school year and who were expected to graduate four years later by August 1st. Students have four full years to graduate, including the summer following their 12th grade year. To capture the outcomes of students completing requirements in their final summer of school, the reporting of graduation must be lagged by one year. That is, the graduation rates of 2017 are reported in 2018.
In order to understand how graduation rates and points for school grading are determined, we need to look at the following components. First of all, we need to know how cohort members are determined. Then we need to understand how the shared accountability model is applied. Finally, we need to understand how the graduation rates are computed and how graduation points are determined for school grading.

4. Creation of 4-Year Graduation Cohort
A student’s snapshot history (40D, 80D, 120D, EOY), grade level and school year information determine the student’s 4-year cohort membership.
Identify the first two consecutive snapshots pair in high school.
From the second snapshot of the snapshot pair, identify the grade level and the school year.
Determine the cohort year (expected graduation year).
If grade level is 9, add 3 to the snapshot school year.
If grade level is 10, add 2 to the snapshot school year.
If grade level is 11, add 1 to the snapshot school year.
If grade level is 12, add 0 to the snapshot school year.
Let’s take a closer look at cohort assignment. A high school student group is named by their expected graduation year. For example, the cohort of 2018 is a group of students who are expected to graduate in the school year 2018.
As an initial step to determine when students are expected to graduate and create a four-year graduation cohort, the PED needs to identify the first two consecutive snapshots (40D, 80D, 120D, or EOY) of each high school student based on STARS data.
Once two consecutive snapshots are identified, the second snapshot of the snapshot pair is used to determine the grade level of the student and the school year.
The last step is to determine the expected graduation year, or the cohort year of the student. If the student was a 9th grader in the school year of 2015 based on the second snapshot, then the student would be expected to graduate in four years, that is, graduating in the school year of If the student was a 10th grader in the school year of 2015, then the student would be expected to graduate in the school year of 2017.

5. 4-Year, 5-Year, and 6-Year Cohorts
4-Year Cohort of 2018
5-Year Cohort of 2018
6-Year Cohort of 2018
Grade 9 10 11 12
School Year
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
Students who qualify to be members of the four-year cohort are then tracked for two additional years and reported in the 5th and 6th years named for their original cohort. In this example, a 9th grader in the school year of 2015 is expected to graduate in 2018, so the student is a member of the four-year cohort of This student is tracked for two more years after 2018, and therefore the student is also a member of the 5-year cohort of 2018 and the 6-year cohort of Students may take 5, 6, or more years to graduate, and their schools will receive some credit for these late graduates. We’ll talk more about 5-year and 6-year graduation rates later in this presentation.

6. Outcomes Excusing Cohort Membership
Deceased
Emigrated from the U.S. and territories
Foreign exchange students on “J” or “F” visa
Students without two consecutive snapshots
Certain students will be excused from their cohort memberships and won’t count towards their schools’ graduation rates. These students include students who have passed away, emigrated students from the U.S. and its territories, and foreign exchange students who are on J or F visas. Additionally, students without two consecutive snapshots while in high school are exempt from graduation rate computation.

7. Who is Considered a Transfer?
Student must exit to an educational setting that can potentially grant a diploma.
Out-of-state schools
Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) schools
Exchange programs in other countries
Private schools
Home schools
Military schools overseas
Other non-PED education settings
Finally, students who left the New Mexico public school system and are enrolled in either out-of-state schools, Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) schools, exchange programs in other countries, private schools, home schools, military schools overseas, or any other non-PED educational settings are excused from their cohort and do not count towards graduation rate computation.

8. Can a Student Be Moved to Different Cohort?
A student can be reassigned to a new cohort when he/she:
Has at least a gap of 9 consecutive snapshots.
Shares a student ID with another student or has multiple student IDs.
Students can only be reassigned to a new cohort under the following two circumstances.
The first one is when a student has at least a gap of nine consecutive snapshots during his or her high school career.
The second is when a student appears to share a student ID with another student or has multiple student IDs.

9. Who is Considered a Graduate? Who Is Considered a Nongraduate?
Graduates
Standard high school diploma including ability and career pathways
Complete requirements by August 1
Students who graduated early
Nongraduates
GED
Certificate of Completion
Dropped out
Still enrolled
Status unknown
Graduates are students who receive a standard high school diploma that is fully aligned with New Mexico’s academic content standards, including students on ability and career pathways. To be considered a successful graduate, a student must complete all academic requirements by August 1 of the cohort year. Students who graduated early also count as successful graduates in the cohort to which they were originally assigned.
Students who exit high school with a GED or a Certificate of Completion (that is, completing all course requirements but not demonstrating proficiency in the five required subject areas of reading, writing, mathematics, science, and social studies) are considered nongraduates. Students who dropped out of their high schools or are still currently enrolled are also considered to be nongraduates. Finally, students whose current status are unknown are also nongraduates.

10. Shared Accountability
Shared Accountability Model
The fraction of the snapshots each student obtained is applied to each attended school during the student’s high school career.
Total snapshots
16 for 4 years
20 for 5 years
24 for 6 years
Graduates: Applied to numerator and denominators
Nongraduates: Applied to denominators only
Shared Accountability is a method developed to hold all schools accountable for their efforts to graduate students. In this way, feedback is provided to all high schools, including every school with any combination of grades 9 through 12. A small number of new schools whose students have not yet reached the age of 4-year graduation do not receive a graduation rate until their first 4-year cohort reaches the graduation age. A student’s outcome is distributed to each high school the student attended according to the fraction of time he or she spent at the school.
To this end, snapshots from 9th through 12th grades are used as the unit of time. Students are tracked with four snapshots per year, yielding a maximum of 16 snapshots for the 4-year time span, 20 snapshots for the 5-year time span, and 24 snapshots for the 6-year time span. For example, if a student who successfully graduated spent one year (four snapshots) at School A, two years (eight snapshots) at School B, and one year (four snapshots) at School C, then School A and School C both get a quarter of the credit, and school B gets half of the credit for that student graduating. In other words, the outcomes for students who are mobile and attended multiple high schools are shared proportionately among all of the attended schools.
Every student contributes a total count of 1 to the numerator and denominator of the graduation rates for schools, districts, and the state. When a student successfully graduates, the student’s fractions are applied to both numerators and denominators of the rates for all the schools he or she attended. When a student is considered to be a nongraduate, his or her fractions are included in denominators only.

11. Shared Accountability & Graduation Rate Computation
Student
High School
Count of Snapshots in School
Count of Snapshots in State
Fraction
for that
School
Graduated
(Y/N)
Graduation Numerator proportions
Graduation Denominator proportions
Luis
Pine 4 16
0.25 Y
Cactus 8
0.50
Kayla
Jade 6
0.375 N
0.00 10
0.625
Paul
1.00
Sofia
Dylan 12
0.75
Let’s look at an example. As shown in this table, the graduation rate consists of fractions of students that are reconstituted to make a “whole” student body. Pine High School is held accountable for every student that ever spent any amount of time at the school. The longer the time a student was at Pine High School, the more the impact he or she has had on the school’s rate. When another school contributes to the student’s success or failure, both Pine High School and the other school share responsibility.
In this table, the shading is applied by student. For example, the information for Luis is shown in gray. Luis transferred into New Mexico as a 10th grader. He spent one year at Pine High School and two years at Cactus High. When he graduated, Pine High School gets 0.25 (or 4 out of 16 total snapshots), which is the fraction of Luis’s time spent at the school. Cactus High gets 0.5 (or 8 out of 16 total snapshots).

12. Shared Accountability & Graduation Rate Computation
Student
High School
Count of Snapshots in School
Count of Snapshots in State
Fraction
for that
School
Graduated
(Y/N)
Graduation Numerator proportions
Graduation Denominator proportions
Luis
Pine 4 16
0.25 Y
Cactus 8
0.50
Kayla
Jade 6
0.375 N
0.00 10
0.625
Paul
1.00
Sofia
Dylan 12
0.75
Jade, on the other hand, attended New Mexico schools for her four years of high school and therefore appeared in a total of 16 snapshots. She was at Pine High for 6 out of 16 snapshots for a fraction of .375, and she attended Cactus High for 10 out of 16 snapshots, making a fraction of .625 for that school.
Paul is showing in the state’s STARS system to have been in New Mexico public schools for only 10 snapshots. He may have attended, for example, a home school or a private school. He was at Pine High School all 10 of those snapshots so the fraction allocated to Pine High is 1, or 10 out of 10.

13. Shared Accountability & Graduation Rate Computation
Student
High School
Count of Snapshots in School
Count of Snapshots in State
Fraction
for That
School
Graduated
(Yes/No)
Graduation Numerator Proportions
Graduation Denominator Proportions
Luis
Pine 4 16
0.25
Yes
Cactus 8
0.50
Kayla
Jade 6
0.375 No
0.00 10
0.625
Paul
1.00
Sofia
Dylan 12
0.75
Let’s look at how graduation rates are computed using shared accountability. This table is the same as the one used in the previous slide but is now shaded by each school, rather than by student: yellow for Pine High and blue for Cactus High.
Pine High School had six members of the cohort who were enrolled for at least some of their high school careers as shown in the yellow rows. Summing the fractions for these students derived from their number of snapshots in Pine High results in 2. These fractions are noted in red in the column titled “Graduation Numerator Proportions” as well as in the Pine High numerator at the bottom of the slide. For the two students who did not graduate (Jade and Dylan), their contribution to the numerator is zero.
Pine High = (𝟎.𝟐𝟓 +𝟎.𝟐𝟓 +𝟎+ 𝟏 +𝟎.𝟓+𝟎) (𝟎.𝟐𝟓 +𝟎.𝟐𝟓 + 𝟎.𝟑𝟕𝟓 + 𝟏 + 𝟎.𝟓 +𝟎.𝟐𝟓) = 𝟐.𝟎𝟎 𝟐.𝟔𝟐𝟓 = → 76.2%

14. Shared Accountability & Graduation Rate Computation
Student
High School
Count of Snapshots in School
Count of Snapshots in State
Fraction
for That
School
Graduated
(Yes/No)
Graduation Numerator Proportions
Graduation Denominator Proportions
Luis
Pine 4 16
0.25
Yes
Cactus 8
0.50
Kayla
Jade 6
0.375 No
0.00 10
0.625
Paul
1.00
Sofia
Dylan 12
0.75
The denominator for Pine High School’s graduation rate is the sum of all students’ fractions from their snapshots. The time that Jade and Dylan attended Pine High counts in the denominator even though they did not successfully complete high school. This denominator is 2.625, the sum of the proportions shown in blue in the last column and also in blue in the equation for Pine High near the bottom of the slide.
The sum of graduates (2.0) divided by the sum of all students (2.625) yields a graduation rate of 76.2% for Pine High School.
Similarly, Cactus High School had four cohort members, and the sum of the graduates (1.0) as shown in green divided by the sum of all students (2.375) as shown in orange yields a graduation rate of 42.1%.
Pine High = (𝟎.𝟐𝟓 +𝟎.𝟐𝟓 +𝟎+ 𝟏 +𝟎.𝟓+𝟎) (𝟎.𝟐𝟓 +𝟎.𝟐𝟓 + 𝟎.𝟑𝟕𝟓 + 𝟏 + 𝟎.𝟓 +𝟎.𝟐𝟓) = 𝟐.𝟎𝟎 𝟐.𝟔𝟐𝟓 = → 76.2%
Cactus High = (𝟎.𝟓 +𝟎+ 𝟎.𝟓 + 𝟎) (𝟎.𝟓 + 𝟎.𝟔𝟐𝟓 +𝟎.𝟓 + 𝟎.𝟕𝟓) = 𝟏.𝟎𝟎 𝟐.𝟑𝟕𝟓 = → 42.1%

15. Points Awarded for School Grading
Subcomponent
Maximum Points
Calculation
4-year graduation rate
8 points
% 4-year graduation rate x 8 points
5-year graduation rate
3 points
% 5-year graduation rate x 3 points
6-year graduation rate
2 points
% 6-year graduation rate x 2 points
Graduation growth
4 points
CDF value x 4 points
Total
17 points
Sum
The graduation component in the A-F school grading system includes 4-year, 5-year, and 6-year rates, which produce a maximum of 8, 3, and 2 points respectively. Points are awarded when the rate is multiplied by the possible points for that category. For example, a 4-year graduation rate of 80% is equal to 0.8 X 8, or 6.4 points. Likewise, a 5-year rate of 90% is equal to 0.9 X 3, or 2.7 points.
Note that although the 5-year graduation rate is typically higher than the 4-year rate, and the 6-year rate is typically higher than 5-year rate, it is possible that the 5-year rate can be lower than the 4-year rate. For 4-year cohort members that transfer to another school during their final year, the time that they spend in the new school counts towards both their old school’s and new school’s rates. When the incoming student does not graduate at the end of his or her 5th year, the new school’s nongraduate population grows, which can cause the overall rate to decline. This is a unique feature of the Shared Accountability model that all schools attended by a student during the 6-year period must share responsibility for the student’s outcome, regardless of whether the student succeeds or fails to graduate.

16. Points Awarded for Graduation Growth
Subcomponent
Maximum Points
Calculation
4-year graduation rate
8 points
% 4-year graduation rate x 8 points
5-year graduation rate
3 points
% 5-year graduation rate x 3 points
6-year graduation rate
2 points
% 6-year graduation rate x 2 points
Graduation growth
4 points
CDF value x 4 points
Total
17 points
Sum
Graduation Growth
Determined by the rate of change (i.e., slope) over the last three years of a school’s 4-year graduation rate
The graduation rate slopes of all New Mexico high school are transformed to CDF values.
Full points for schools with a 90% or higher 4-year graduation rate
In addition to 13 points for graduation rates, there are 4 points for graduation growth in the school grading system. Graduation growth refers to the annual increase in the 4-year graduation rate; this growth reflects the school’s overall ability to help students complete high school in a timely way.
Graduation growth is calculated based on the rate of change, or slope, of the 4-year graduation rate for the past three years. If a school had rates of 50% in 2015, 55% the next year in 2016, and 60% in 2017, then the school’s graduation growth is 5%. In other words, the graduation rate for this school grew 10% (from 50% to 60%) from 2015 to This 10% is divided by 2 to yield 5% growth. Remember that the graduation rates are lagged by a year. The most recent graduation rates in 2018 school grading are those from 2017.

17. Points Awarded for Graduation Growth
Subcomponent
Maximum Points
Calculation
4-year graduation rate
8 points
% 4-year graduation rate x 8 points
5-year graduation rate
3 points
% 5-year graduation rate x 3 points
6-year graduation rate
2 points
% 6-year graduation rate x 2 points
Graduation growth
4 points
CDF value x 4 points
Total
17 points
Sum
Graduation Growth
Determined by the rate of change (i.e., slope) over the last three years of a school’s 4-year graduation rate
The graduation rate slopes of all New Mexico high school are transformed to CDF values.
Full points for schools with a 90% or higher 4-year graduation rate
The percentage of growth undergoes a statistical calculation to arrive at the number of points used in school grading. The slope is divided by the standard deviation of all slopes, resulting in some positive and some negative values. These values are then transformed using a cumulative density function (CDF) into a score that can range from 0 to 1. Points are derived by multiplying the CDF values by the four points possible. More detail on this statistical calculation can be found in the School Grading Technical Guide posted on PED’s website.
The goal in the school grading system is that at least 90% of students graduate in four years, so any school with a rate of 90% or above is awarded all four points possible for graduation growth regardless of the slope for that school.

18. Graduation Rate Computation DIY
Schools can compute their own graduation rates:
Log onto SOAP: select school year, click on “Reports,” and download the “4-year consolidated outcome report” (or the 5- or 6-year report).
Add up all numerator fractions and all the denominator fractions for the cohort.
Download the last 3 years of 4-year cohort graduation rates at and compute the slope for the school.
To calculate the graduation rates of your own school, you need to log onto PED’s secure online assessment portal (SOAP) and download the 4-year consolidated outcome report for your school. You can also download the 5-year or 6-year report to calculate 5-year or 6-year graduation rate. In the report, you will see two columns called “SchoolNumerator” and “SchoolDenominator.”
When you add up all numerator fractions and all the denominator fractions for your school and then divide the numerator sum by the denominator sum, you will get the graduation rate for your school.
To calculate graduation growth, go to the “graduation data” page on the PED website. You can download the last three years of your school’s 4-year cohort graduation rates and calculate the slope for your school.

19. For additional information, please contact
Questions?
For additional information, please contact
Yun Yao, Ph.D.
Alexis Álvarez, Ph.D.
If you have any questions about the calculation of graduation rates or shared accountability, please contact Yun Yao or Alexis Alvarez at the addresses shown. There are also have several documents that provide additional information on these topics, such as the “Graduation Cohort FAQ” and the “Graduation Technical Manual.” These documents are available on the NM Public Education Department’s website. Thank you for your attention.